A half-hour before the show began, Madame ZuZu's Tea Shop and Art Studio was bustling and warm, a crowd of about 40 people talking over mugs of tea as Corgan adjusted his synthesizer equipment on a makeshift stage near the front window.

For some, it was an opportunity to see one of their favorite musicians in an intimate venue, while others felt a personal connection to Herman Hesse's novel.

Some were just baffled by the concept.

"I was just like, what?" said Danielle Beckemeyer, 18, of Chicago. "I was really interested and just wanted to see what it was going to be like."

Nearby, Kirsten Siron Fryer, of Elmhurst, comforted her 17-month-old son, Brody, who was crying after knocking his head on a table.

"I just thought it was a really neat opportunity to see Billy Corgan close up and to expose (Brody) to great music," said Fryer, 37, holding her child. "But I don't know how long we're going to make it."

Outside, a modest queue of people lined up by the door, waiting to be allowed in. Because of limited seating, Madame ZuZu's employees rotated customers in after the first couple of hours.

Just before the show began, a Corgan representative asked this Tribune reporter to leave and said the musician objected to a column written by Tribune reporter Rex Huppke earlier this week about the event.

The live stream on Madame ZuZu's website showed Corgan moving among the controls of his equipment, adjusting his modular synthesizer. A narrator recited passages of "Siddhartha" as sustained notes from the synthesizer created an ethereal effect.

Brent Sekularac, 26, and April Addams, 21, both Corgan fans from Round Lake, said curiosity drew them to the free event.

"It made me really curious how he was going to do that for nine hours because it was such a short book," Addams said. "I'm just anxious to see how that plays out."

The show was still going on at 8 p.m. Sasha Geffen of Chicago, who was covering the event for an online music site said she had been inside for seven hours but it didn’t feel like that long.

"Time definitely works differently in there," Geffen said.

Laine Driscoll, 32, traveled from in from Branford, Conn., and said it was worth the trip.